Wokingham Second World War sailor receives Arctic Star medal

A sailor who served providing cover for merchant ships during the Second World War has received an Arctic Star medal.

Almost 70 years since the end of the war, Frank Clarke received the medal in the post last week in recognition of his time aboard HMS Suffolk from 1940 to 1945.

Mr Clarke was just 16 when he joined the Royal Navy and was the youngest seaman on HMS Suffolk,which escorted ships taking food, fuel and munitions to ports in what is now Russia.

The 89-year-old said: “I had no idea about the medal and I was very much surprised when it arrived.”

Mr Clarke’s daughter Lynn Clarke-Arens researched the medal and applied on behalf of her father.

He was on HMS Suffolk when he heard “a huge explosion” and the crew believed Britain had sunk the German battleship the Bismarck.

Mr Clarke remembered: “We were chasing the Bismarck and thought it had blown up but it was HMS Hood and there were only two survivors.

“It was devastating. We relied on the HMS Hood to fight some of the other battleships.”

HMS Suffolk carried two walrus aircraft which were catapulted off the ship and had to land on the water alongside the ship before being lifted back onto it by a crane, which Mr Clarke controlled.

He recalled: “It was freezing cold with icebergs around. We had to chip ice off of the boat otherwise it would become top heavy and turn over.”

Mr Clarke, who was based in Chatham, was sponsored by two women who visited the orphanage he lived in and they provided a home for him to return to when on leave from the Navy.

Before the Second World War, Mr Clarke was based on training ship HMS Arethusa, which is now known as the Peking and is anchored in New York.

Around 10 years ago Mr Clarke, accompanied by his son-in-law, visited the ship and met someone he served with during the war.

Mr Clarke served in the Royal Navy for 12 years and travelled all over the world after the war including the Far East, Australia and Hong Kong.

He said: “I went to places I had never even heard of in the tropics.”

The former sailor was on HMS London which was tasked to rescue the Amethyst from Communist Chinese forces up the Yangtze River however, the ship was hit and forced to retreat.

Mr Clarke remained in the Medway towns before moving to Wokingham in 2000.

For his 80th birthday his daughter researched his family tree and they discovered his mother, who left him in an orphanage, went onto to have three further children – two boys and a girl.

His other daughter Ann Warner said: “One of them agreed to meet dad. They had no idea. His mother lived to be 99 and died about two years before we made contact with the family.”

Arctic convoy veterans were eligible to receive the Atlantic Star but after a campaign by them and service charities Prime Minister David Cameron announced the creation of the Arctic Star in December 2012.